The World's Oldest Profession: Evolutionary Insights into Prostitution
Abstract
Prostitution, sometimes referred to as the world's oldest profession, arouses strong sentiment. It is defined as "the act or practice of engaging in sexual activity for money or its equivalent." From a cross-cultural perspective, this definition can be problematic in that gift giving, of goods or money, often occurs in the context of courtship, extramarital affairs, and marital relationships. It is usually males who give such gifts to their sexual partner, even when females have the same degree of sexual freedom as males. Nevertheless, in the United States (except in certain counties in Nevada) it is illegal to be paid for a sex act, as it is in many other countries. Yet there is strong debate over the nature of the act and whether it should be considered a crime. This chapter examines the insight an evolutionary psychological perspective can provide on these issues; addresses the reasons for the existence of prostitution; and explores why it is a service almost exclusively provided to men, typically by women.
... These crimes include sexual harassment, rape, and intimate partner violence and are far more often committed against women by men (Daly and Wilson 1988). Additionally, we will describe the crime of prostitution, which in some jurisdictions is not considered a crime (Salmon 2008). Sexual crimes are some of the most easily understood crimes when using an evolutionary perspective, given their importance and consequences regarding reproductive success (Duntley and Shackelford 2008). ...
... Often described as the world's oldest profession, prostitution constitutes an interesting example from both an evolutionary and legal perspective. From a legal perspective, some countries, and even within some states in the United States (e.g., Nevada), prostitution is not considered a criminal offense (Salmon 2008). In many other countries including Canada, it is not illegal to sell sexual services (i.e., to offer sex for money). ...
... Who tends to purchase sex for money? Overwhelmingly, men are the clients, and they are often, but not exclusively, purchasing the sexual services of women, some of whom are street sex workers, but most (~75%) of whom are in-call or out-call sex workers (Salmon 2008). Why are men tending to be the purchasers and women the sellers? ...
... To take one example, prostitution is not a social phenomenon that can be explained solely by social forces such as poverty. It is men's evolved nature to pursue sex with a variety of women without commitment, obligation and courtship which gives rise to this practice (Salmon 2008). To put it differently, if men had been evolved to pursue sex only with women with whom they are emotionally involved, there would be no prostitution. ...
... Foot-binding is a well-known mating-control institution, albeit confined to China, where it was practiced for more than 10 centuries. It originally appeared as a practice of the aristocracy, but eventually found its way to the lower social strata (Mackie 1996; Ping 2002). In this institution, the mother or another female relative binds her daughter's feet when she is four or five years old and sometimes before that age (Jackson 1997). ...
... This is a painful procedure, which involved each of the toes to be broken and pressed under the sole of the foot. Following that, the arches of the feet are also broken, and the broken feet are bound tightly with the toes folded under the sole of the foot (Jackson, 1997; Ping 2002). The result of this procedure is for women's feet to remain small when they reach adulthood and for their walking to be severely impaired (Jackson 1997). ...
Parents and offspring often have conflicting interests over mating, which results in the ideal spouse not being the ideal in-law and the ideal in-law not being the ideal spouse. This induces parents to control the mating decisions of their offspring, which in turn gives rise to social institutions that uphold this control. Based on this theoretical framework, it is predicted that these institutions intend predominantly to control the mating decisions of the female offspring when they are young, that they are more prevalent among the upper strata, and that they arise only in an ecological context where parents are able to exercise some degree of control over the mating decisions of their offspring. These predictions are examined on a number of institutions, such as arranged marriage and female circumcision.
... But few have directly assessed differences in major dimensions of personality (i.e., constellations of enduring individual differences in emotion, motivation, thoughts, and behavior) among those paying for prostitution (Wilson et al., 1992;Xantidis and McCabe, 2000;Sawyer et al., 2001). Several scholars have approached the topic of prostitution using the framework of evolutionary psychology (Burley and Symanski, 1981;Buss and Schmitt, 2001;Salmon, 2008;Prokop et al., 2018;Dylewski and Prokop, 2019). However, to our knowledge, none have explicitly considered the utility of an evolutionary personality perspective in studying male clients of prostitution, which is the focus of the current mini-review. ...
... Evolutionary scholars have argued that prostitution qualifies a form of short-term mating because it tends to involve an explicit exchange of goods (e.g., money, jewelry, and/or drugs) for temporary and impersonal sexual intimacy (Burley and Symanski, 1981;Buss and Schmitt, 2001;Salmon, 2008;Meskó et al., 2014;Prokop et al., 2018;Dylewski and Prokop, 2019). Previous researchers have shown how several non-human animals exchange material resources for sexual opportunities and vice versa. ...
Many scholars have investigated the attitudes, beliefs, motives, and behavior of male clients of female sex workers. However, few have examined individual differences in major dimensions of personality expressed by men who purchase prostitution compared to those who do not. Although several evolutionary psychologists have studied prostitution and those involved in sex work, to our knowledge, none have explicitly considered the utility of an evolutionary personality perspective in trying to understand why particular men pay for sex. In the current mini-review, following other researchers, prostitution is described principally as a form of short-term mating sought primarily by men. We argue that the socially aversive traits embodying the Dark Tetrad (narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy, and sadism) may characterize certain male clients of female sex workers, particularly those consumers expressing the motives of desiring exciting and novel sex with women who are treated with contempt, perceiving prostitution in a business-like manner with little emotional involvement, and seeking to dominate and control sex workers who are viewed as vulnerable and subservient. The traits of the tetrad may also be more prevalent among men who purchase sex from female sex workers in outdoor (e.g., street prostitution) in comparison to indoor settings (e.g., escort agencies).
... Accordingly, one of the most common evolutionary explanations for men's more pronounced motivation for engaging in transactional sex attributes this sex difference to men's need for promiscuity (e.g., Symons, 1979;Burley and Symanski, 1981;Salmon, 2008). The sexual strategies theory Schmitt, 1993, 2019) describes transactional sex (e.g., prostitution) as an extremely short-term mate choice strategy and draws a parallel between mate choice and marketing in terms of their underlying mechanisms (see Buss and Foley, 2019). ...
... The sexual strategies theory Schmitt, 1993, 2019) describes transactional sex (e.g., prostitution) as an extremely short-term mate choice strategy and draws a parallel between mate choice and marketing in terms of their underlying mechanisms (see Buss and Foley, 2019). Salmon (2008) goes as far as suggesting that since men are much more willing than women to engage in purely physical casual sexual encounters, and they actively seek such encounters, this preference is a clearly favorable condition for transactional sex. ...
A sugar relationship is a transactional sexual relationship in which a younger partner (sugar baby/boy) offers companionship and sexual services to a much older partner (sugar daddy/mommy) in return for material compensation. One aim of the present study was to develop an attitude scale assessing young women’s and men’s acceptance of sugar relationships. Another aim was to explore the possible associations of the acceptance of sugar relationships with psychological functioning in an intimate partner relationship and in a sexual relationship and with certain socially undesirable personality traits. Two online studies were conducted with a total number of 2052 participants (1879 women; age = 18–28 years). The results show that the Acceptance of Sugar Relationships in Young Women and Men Scale (ASR-YWMS) is a reliable and valid measure of young people’s attitude toward sugar relationships. The studies revealed that young women’s and men’s accepting attitude toward sugar relationships was positively associated with unrestricted sociosexuality, a game-playing love style (Ludus), self-focused sexual motivation (Study 1; N = 319; 272 women and 47 men), and with socially undesirable traits such as Machiavellianism, subclinical psychopathy, and a borderline personality organization (Study 2; N = 1733; 1607 women and 126 men). These findings suggest that a relatively high level of acceptance of sugar relationships is part of a mating strategy focused on opportunities of maximizing resources. This utilitarian, risk-taking and exploitative attitude is characteristic to a fast life history strategy, and it is a fundamental organizing principle of psychological and sexual functioning in intimate partner relationships.
... At the same time, the conclusion of the poll, that "women tend to believe sex with prostitutes is a greater betrayal [than an extramarital romantic affair]" (Jones, 2008, p.1), is not tenable from an evolutionary perspective. Prostitutes represent a lesser threat to the emotional bond of the marriage, and should be preferred by women over an extramarital romantic affair (Salmon, 2008). ...
... If the husband (or romantic partner) has sex with prostitutes, the risk for emotional commitment is low, since this extramarital sexual relation is financially based, and with payment both parties consider the business finished (e.g. Salmon, 2008;Burley & Symanski, 1981). Next, women's emotional reactions, perceptions and motivations connected to sexual and emotional infidelity are reviewed. ...
In a recent poll women morally convicted husbands’ relations with prostitutes. From an evolutionary point of view women’s reproductive success has been influenced more by their partner’s emotional infidelity than by his sexual infidelity. Women have been less sensitive to sexual than to emotional infidelity, because latter could have resulted in losing their partner’s resources. In our study women reported an unanimous opinion. As compared to a former girlfriend, women reported less intensive negative emotional reactions, and more forgiveness, if their partner betrayed them with a prostitute. Women evaluated betrayal with a prostitute as less threatening for their ongoing relationship. We conclude that it is still the evolutionary interest of women to form a more negative attitude toward betrayal with a former girlfriend than toward betrayal with prostitutes.
... A prostitúció egyik evolúciós értelmezése szerint a jelenség oka a nôi és férfi szexualitás pszichológiája közötti alapvetô különbségekben rejlik (37) és lényegében a férfi szexualitás természetébôl adódik: "a prostitúció nem a férfiak nôkkel kapcsolatos érzéseirôl és attitûdjérôl árulkodik, hanem a férfi szexualitás természetérôl" (38). Az a különbség nô és férfi között, amely a párkeresô és párválasztási viselkedésben és az annak hátterében meghúzódó pszichológiai motivációban mérhetô, Trivers (44) modellje szerint a nemenként eltérô mértékû szülôi ráfordítással van összefüggésben. ...
... Ezzel összhangban a férfiak több szexuális partnert jelölnek meg ideális partnerként, mint a nôk (40), és nyitottabbak a rövid távú, érzelmi elkötelezôdés nélküli, alkalmi szexuális kapcsolatok iránt (10). A nôi prostitúció egyik evolúciós elképzelése szerint éppen a férfiaknak ez a hajlama áll a jelenség kialakulásának hátterében (8,37). Néhány vizsgálatban be is számolnak arról, hogy a férfiak sokkal inkább hajlamosak (akár nôi, akár férfi) prostituáltnak fizetni rövid távú szexuális kapcsolatért, mint a nôk (8,31,41). ...
Bevezetés: A társadalomtudományi diskurzusok nem adnak ultimatív magyarázatot a prostitúció evolúciós eredetére, hanem a jelenség társadalmi szerepére irányítják a figyelmet. A pszichológiai elméletek és kutatások igyekeznek feltárni a jelenség természetét, hogy jobban megérthessük a mûködés sajátosságait. A prostitúciót korábban két evolúciós megközelítésből magyarázták. A párválasztási stratégiák elmélete szerint a prostitúció jelenségének ősi mozgatója a férfi-szexualitás természetében keresendő. A másik elképzelés, a nôi promiszkuitás motivációs bázisának evolúciós értelmezése, közvetve ad kiegészítést a prostitúció jelenségének megértéséhez. Megvilágítja, hogy a nôi promiszkuitás milyen adaptív előnyökkel járhatott bizonyos körülmények között az evolúciós múltban. Vizsgáltunk célja egy harmadik típusú elképzelés (az adaptív támogatási elmélet) tesztelése, amely szerint a tartós kapcsolatban élô nôk támogatják partnerük, férjük prostituálttal való kapcsolatát, mert az ilyen, üzleti alapon mûködô külső szexuális kapcsolat kevésbé veszélyezteti a párkapcsolat stabilitását, mint a szexuális hűtlenség más fajtái. Módszer: A vizsgálati eljárásban egyetemista nôk (n=208, átlagéletkor±SD=23,55±7,13, min=18, max=50) kérdőívet töltöttek ki. Eredmények: A résztvevô nôk képesek felmérni partnerük prostituálttal való kapcsolatának nyereség–veszteség következményeit. Ugyanakkor közvetlenül nem támogatják a férfi félrelépésének ezt a formáját szemben más lehetőségekkel. Közvetett támogatásként értékeltük azonban azt, hogy a válaszadó nôk szignifikánsan nagyobb mértékben tart-ják elfogadhatónak partnerük prostituálttal való szexuális kapcsolatát (egy képzeletbeli helyzetben), mint amennyire ezt a lehetőséget partnerük szerintük igényelné. Következtetések: Modellünk szerint a tartós párkapcsolatban élô nőnek adaptív érdeke fűződik ahhoz, hogy hűtlen partnere inkább prostituálttal lépjen félre (mintsem a megcsalás egyéb módjait válassza), mert a tisztán üzleti alapú szexuális hűtlenség kevésbé kockáztatja a hosszú távú párkapcsolat stabilitását.
... A prostitúció egyik evolúciós értelmezése szerint a jelenség oka a nôi és férfi szexualitás pszichológiája közötti alapvetô különbségekben rejlik (37) és lényegében a férfi szexualitás természetébôl adódik: "a prostitúció nem a férfiak nôkkel kapcsolatos érzéseirôl és attitûdjérôl árulkodik, hanem a férfi szexualitás természetérôl" (38). Az a különbség nô és férfi között, amely a párkeresô és párválasztási viselkedésben és az annak hátterében meghúzódó pszichológiai motivációban mérhetô, Trivers (44) modellje szerint a nemenként eltérô mértékû szülôi ráfordítással van összefüggésben. ...
... Ezzel összhangban a férfiak több szexuális partnert jelölnek meg ideális partnerként, mint a nôk (40), és nyitottabbak a rövid távú, érzelmi elkötelezôdés nélküli, alkalmi szexuális kapcsolatok iránt (10). A nôi prostitúció egyik evolúciós elképzelése szerint éppen a férfiaknak ez a hajlama áll a jelenség kialakulásának hátterében (8,37). Néhány vizsgálatban be is számolnak arról, hogy a férfiak sokkal inkább hajlamosak (akár nôi, akár férfi) prostituáltnak fizetni rövid távú szexuális kapcsolatért, mint a nôk (8,31,41). ...
Until now prostitution has only been explained from two evolutionary points of view. According to the short-term mate choice strategy approach motives for seeking prostitutes are to be found in the nature of male sexuality. Another theory - the evolutionary interpretation of female promiscuity's motivational base - indirectly completes the understanding of prostitution. This theory emphasizes the adaptive benefits of female promiscuity under certain circumstances. The aim of our study was to test a third idea (Adaptive Support Theory), according to which women in long-term relationships support their partners' (husbands') sexual relations with prostitutes.
University female students (n=208, age mean±SD=23.55±7.13, min=18, max=50) completed our questionnaire.
Female participants are presumed to recognize the advantages and threats of their partners' sexual relations with prostitutes compared to other possible forms of betrayal. Hence it is hypothesized that women overtly support the possibility of their partners' relations with prostitutes. Our results show that women are able to assess the favorable and unfavorable effects of their partners' relations with prostitutes. At the same time they do not directly support this form of betrayal over other possibilities. However, female participants were more approving of their partners' relations with prostitutes (in a thought- experiment), than they guessed their partner would demand such services.
According to our model women living in long-term relationship are adaptively interested in their partner's cheating on them with a prostitute (rather than engaging in other kinds of sexual relations), because this finance based external sexual liaison is the least threatening for the stability of the long-term relationship.
... Prostitution is often called the world's oldest profession (Salmon 2010). Its history in Zimbabwe traces back to the colonial era. ...
The perpetual decline of Zimbabwe’s socio-economic situation can be found in the country legalising prostitution, which it used to regard as an act of criminality. This legalisation promoted the trade from being an offense to a lifestyle and from being an act of immorality to a profession. Prostitutes were also advanced from being social outcasts to commercial sex workers. Although the law appeared to financially empower prostitutes, its negative impact is seen in the level it dehumanises teen girls as they turn themselves into sex objects. Cases of school dropouts among teen girls and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) are some of the evidences of the negative impact of prostitution, caused by their belief that ‘unprotected sex pays more’. The location of the study was Epworth Booster in Harare, Zimbabwe. Using an African feminist theology framework, this article aims to analyse how women’s theology can be used as a panacea to restore dignity and hunhu-ism to the teen girls whose bodies have been exposed to abuse by their purported fathers. The article uses both unstructured and focus group interviews to collect data from three health personnel and 10 teen girls, respectively. The article grapples with the fact that the legalisation of prostitution in Zimbabwe seriously affected both the social and religious life of teen girls as they risk their lives in order to earn a living, and African feminist theology should be applied to defend these vulnerable girls.
Contribution: In the context of socio-economic depletion and laws that suppress women in the name of empowering them, rereading and application of women’s theology should protect women and offer them a future with hope.
... On the other hand, risk for infections could be higher. (4) The fourth possible scenario is a financially based sexual relation with a prostitute (Salmon, 2008). In this form of sexual infidelity, the risk for emotional commitment between the partner and the prostitute is low, whereas the risk of STDs is higher than in the former scenarios. ...
The aim of our study was to investigate how two evolutionary challenges, namely threat of abandonment resulting from partner's emotional infidelity and threat of infections, affect women's attitudes toward their partner's hypothetical betrayal on them. First, we presumed that women evaluate the two threats differently depending on the context of betrayal. Accordingly, we asked women to rate the perceived threats in different scenarios of their long-term partner's betrayal. Second, we presumed that women would form their preferences or disapprovals towards their partners’ betrayal with different persons (former partner, new partner, casual sexual partner, prostitute) in terms of avoidance of abandonment resulting from partner's emotional infidelity. Based on this hypothesis, we expected women to disapprove of their partner's sexual relation with a prostitute the least. Female students (n=208) completed a questionnaire with a thought-experiment, with a hypothetical case, where they temporarily cannot have sex with their partner for medical reasons. Our results confirmed the first hypothesis. The second hypothesis was partially disconfirmed, because we found patterns of preference or disapproval cannot be predicted from the sole perspectives of disease avoidance and abandonment avoidance. The two evolutionary challenges discussed in this paper do not explain our results in themselves, so we discuss social and cultural explanations as well.
This paper is a postphenomenological investigation of cyber bodies and their politics. A case study is made through cyborg microcelebrity Lil Miquela and her role in the attention economy. The relevance of embodiment, re-embodiment and disembodiment is critically considered through Kirk M. Besmer (2015), Donna J. Haraway (1991) and Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s (1974) theoretical exploration.
Analyzed cross-cultural child inculcation data from Barry, Josephson, Lauer, & Marshall (1976) by testing a hypothesis derived from natural selection theory: The ways in which boys are trained (vs. those for girls) should correlate with male and female reproductive strategies prevalent in each society. Boys are trained to be more aggressive, show more fortitude, and be more self-reliant than girls; girls are trained to be more industrious, responsible, obedient, and sexually restrained than boys. The more polygynous the society (the higher the potential reproductive rewards for males), the more sons in nonstratified societies were taught to strive. Stratified societies, which restrict men's reproductive striving, showed very different patterns. The more actual control women in any society had over resources, the less daughters were taught to be obedient.
Short-term and long-term habituation of sexual arousal was investigated in a crossover design. Nine subjects completed six sessions semiweekly for 3 consecutive weeks. Sessions were scheduled at least 2 days but not more than 4 days apart. Each session consisted of 15 stimulus periods and 15 detumescence periods. Sexually explicit audio stimuli were administered. There were two conditions in the crossover design, which allowed each participant to serve as his own control. During one half of the sessions subjects were exposed to 15 different scripts (varied condition); during the remaining sessions subjects were exposed to the same script 45 times (15 trials for each of three sessions, the constant condition). The constant stimulus condition was the experimental habituation condition, whereas the varied stimuli served as a control for physiological fatigue. Scripts were randomly assigned to stimulus conditions. Subjects showed systematic decreases in penile responding within the second and third constant stimulus conditions, but no systematic decreases were noted in any of the varied stimulus conditions. Subjects evidenced significant long-term decreases in physiological responding only in the constant stimulus condition as well as short-term decreases in subjective report of arousal. Long-term habituation of sexual arousal may be related to molar behaviors such as promiscuity and the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, and may be tied to sociobiological accounts of long-term sexual behavior patterns in human males.
The goal of this study was to explore if and how personality characteristics are associated with sociosexuality (i.e., individual differences in the willingness to engage in sex outside the context of a committed relationship). Toward this end, we used correlation, multiple regression, and path analysis to examine the associations of sociosexuality with: (1) the normal-range personality traits of the five-factor model, (2) a sexual attitude\affect dimension called erotophobia-erotophilia, and (3) ego development. The sample consisted of 350 Asian and Caucasian college students. Our final path model indicated that, regardless of ethnicity, extroversion, low agreeableness, and erotophilia were direct predictors of unrestricted sociosexuality. Furthermore, openness was an indirect predictor of sociosexuality through its association with erotophilia. However, our final path model also included ethnic differences. Specifically, in the Caucasian sample low agreeableness and openness were significant predictors of erotophilia, but in the Asian sample low neuroticism and openness combined to predict erotophilia. Finally, an interaction was observed between ethnicity and ego development in predicting unrestricted sociosexuality. For our Caucasian sample, increases in ego development were negatively correlated with unrestricted sociosexuality, while for Asians, increasing levels of ego development were not associated with sociosexuality. In other words, as ego development increases, Caucasians become more like Asians in that they are more sexually constrained or restricted. In the conclusion, we offer explanations of the results and discuss findings in terms of several theories of human sexual behavior.
Changes in the social structure of early humans greatly enhanced the potential for paternal care to contribute to offspring success. Selection therefore favored females who mated with more paternal males. Since paternal care limits mating effort, males least successful as polygynists would have the most to gain by paternal behavior, while the successful polygynists would gain least. Concealed ovulation may have evolved because it promoted the paternal tendencies of the less polygynous males who advanced female reproductive success the most. Since the offspring of indulgent males would have a competitive advantage over the offspring of more polygynous males, and females revealing the time of ovulation would become increasingly scarse, all males would eventually pursue a reproductive strategy emphasizing paternal effort over mating effort.In nonhuman primates the most polygynous males mate selectively with females who are likely to be ovulating. Such males would probably not mate with females having diminished cues to the time of ovulation. The more paternally prone males could therefore consort with these females and experience a high confidence of paternity. Another characteristic of nonhuman primates is that the most successful polygynists tend to have a high dominance rank. Thus, female hominids who mated with more paternal males may have sacrificed having offspring with some of the genetic advantages that contribute to dominance. However, subsconscious physiological and psychological correlates of ovulation in humans may have tempted females to exploit infrequent, low-risk opportunities to mate outside the pair-bond with males of superior genetic fitness. These correlates may also promote conception irrespective of mating partner, or they may have helped females avoid rape.
Introduction. Prostitution has been legalised in several Australian states and territories during the past twenty-five years. Street walking or public soliciting for the purposes of prostitution is legal in New South Wales (NSW). Brothels and/or escort agencies may operate openly in Victoria, NSW, Queensland, the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory (ACT). In most cases, brothel premises and the owners and operators of brothels (not workers) are subject to licensing and sex workers employed in legal prostitution businesses have many of the same rights as other Australian workers (Sullivan 1997). This trend towards the legalisation of prostitution in Australia makes it similar to the Netherlands but puts it at clear odds with countries such as Britain, Canada, the USA and France. Like other former British colonies, Australia's legal system was inherited from Britain. Thus, while the act of prostitution has never been illegal, until recently most prostitution-related activities – for example, keeping a brothel, soliciting for the purposes of prostitution and living on the earnings of prostitution – attracted criminal penalties. This is still the situation in the three ‘unreformed’ states of Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania. However, in other Australian jurisdictions, the ‘British’ model of prostitution law started to change in the late 1970s and 1980s.
Most research investigating risk practices for HIV infection and other STDs amongst sex workers has focused on street prostitutes to the exclusion of those prostitutes who work in different sections of the industry. This is largely a consequence of methodological difficulties in accessing prostitutes other than those who work on the streets. HIV prevention research and interventions must address the fact that risk practices may vary according to the type of prostitution engaged in. This paper reports on risk practices for HIV infection and other STDs amongst prostitutes working in legalized brothels in Victoria, Australia. A self-administered questionnaire was distributed by representatives of a sex worker organization whose collaboration was an important factor in obtaining a large sample of prostitutes. The study found low levels of risk practices for prostitutes working in legal brothels in Victoria. The major risk practices indentified were injecting drug use and condom non-use with non-paying partners.
Evolutionary psychology focuses on the study of adaptations. Its practitioners put little credence in the study of reproductive success in recent and current environments, and argue for an information-processing, cost-benefit conception of adaptation. Because ancestral and current environments differ, it is necessary to distinguish between innate and operational adaptations and between concurrently contingent and developmentally contingent behaviors. These distinctions lead to an evolutionary classification of behaviors into true pathologies, pseudopathologies, quasinormal behaviors, and adaptive-culturally-variable behaviors. I argue that a complete study of the functioning of a behavioral adaptation involves modeling ancestral selection pressures, cross-cultural research, experimental studies of mental processes, and studies of the proximate biological correlates of information-processing adaptations. Finally, I claim that evolutionary psychology can help us avoid making both naturalistic and moralistic fallacies.
This paper reports on findings from an ethnographic study of female sex workers who work in the indoor sex markets in a British city. An unexpected finding was the collective narratives that sex workers construct to rationalise their involvement in the sex industry. Fifty-five respondents who took part in in-depth interviews maintained that prostitution is a useful occupation and function in society. Narratives included providing emotional support to male clients; a service for men who are socially or physically disabled; preventing men having adulterous affairs; and health education, disease prevention and as therapists for sexual dysfunction. This paper evaluates how the latter narrative of sexual health promotion is an example of how sex workers are ideally placed to work as health educators with men who buy sex. Arguing against gender specific sexual health policies, men who buy sex are described as a 'high risk' group who are also a hidden population. Limitations posed by ideological, ethical and practical concerns relating to the specific conditions of the sex industry suggest that this proposal could be partially successful. In conclusion, I suggest the sexual health of the nation and the place of sex workers in society must be considered with regard to recent policy debates on the management of prostitution and the cultural construction of the sex worker.